


Costumed

by thebasement_archivist



Category: The X-Files
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-05-29
Updated: 2002-05-29
Packaged: 2018-11-20 21:30:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11343534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebasement_archivist/pseuds/thebasement_archivist
Summary: Note from alice ttlg, the archivist: this story was originally archived atThe Basement, which moved to the AO3 to ensure the stories are always available and so that authors may have complete control of their own works. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in June 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address onThe Basement's collection profile.





	Costumed

**Author's Note:**

> Note from alice ttlg, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Basement](http://fanlore.org/wiki/The_Basement), which moved to the AO3 to ensure the stories are always available and so that authors may have complete control of their own works. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in June 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Basement's collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/thebasement/profile).

Costumed

## Costumed

#### by Fox Mulder

Date: Tuesday, September 18, 2001 12:15 PM Costumed by Fox Mulder  
The disclaimers are out there.  
* _Please_ * send feedback if you like this. But send it to the list or to theblack; this _is_ me but I needed another address to post from because hotmail wouldn't let me.  
This one _is_ a fic, pieced together from true events. My deepest thanks  & admiration to Drowning Pool, Saliva, Disturbed, & Staind for their lyrics 

* * *

"Memories overtaking me  
I try to face them but  
The thought is too much to conceive. . ." 

I wake from the dream, again, not so much coming fully awake as sliding into the night like a pool of warm water. I blink, once, twice, and when I raise my hands to my face they come away wet. So, again, and who is here to hold my head, to chase away the ghosts of an endless night? 

No one. No one at all. 

And so I stand, feeling the light fall breeze pass in through the open bedroom window and raise light goosebumps on my naked body, and I want very much - very much - to cry. But I don't, I swallow the feeling like some new and exotic poison and stoop, drawing on a thin pair of white cotton boxer shorts and a pair of black jeans. Into the bathroom, passing the thin green of the digital clock on the microwave that reads 2:14 a.m., and when I slick back my hair and raise my dripping face my eyes are red. Good, crazy Mulder, crazy fucking Mulder. Chasing ghosts. Chasing dreams. Chasing eternity, always, forever, reassurance. Love. 

Lies. 

Sleep is impossible, so it is a black leather jacket over my bare chest and outside, lacing up my black boots before the door. The night is cold and I shudder, as much in internal pain as outside chill. This feeling is too big to contain; empty schoolyards, basketball courts, the lonely sound of an engine on the highway at 3 a.m. There is nothing left for me, not Samantha, not "the truth" - we are all, all of us, players. Greater men than I have said it. The task is staying alive once you know you're useless. Keeping going, trying to find a reason, a justification, a purpose. Does someone love you? Do you love them? It only takes a second, a moment, to lose something that you thought was forever. 

What is it? Is it existential angst? Or something less noble, the feeling that I died over there in Tunguska but I'm still breathing, and if God was going to put me through that, bring me back, that there damn well better be a reason? What child have I saved, since I've been "alive"? Who have I stood in the way of, stood up to? And yet it's not even that, it's merely a huge blackness, something swelling, rising in me that nothing can contain. A becoming. 

I light a cigarette - a habit I've picked up again, for better or worse -and lie back, looking at the stars. They're beautiful, really, and to quote someone from a long time ago, I never really take the time to look at them anymore. Great vastness, power, everything beyond our imaginings. Breathing out cigarette smoke and turning my head, I can see the new mill, with its flashing lights to ward off aircraft and its huge, dark bulk against the sky. Purple smoke and light, flaring, and I think of Spender and Dad and their alien invasion, and I wonder: *Did they ever, _ever_ , really think that it would be so close?* The end of the world, the flaming sky, smoke and fire. Did you ever see an abandoned baseball field, little league, set against a backdrop of smoke and fire and orange light? _Imagine_ the juxtaposition. The end of the world, in technicolor, and it was _me_ , the prodigal son, that was supposed to stand in the way of that. Who was supposed to "fight the future". But tonight, with the dream still so fresh, I see myself as nothing but meat. Meat for the machine. Little Fox, what can I do? Can I stop it? Can I die with dignity? I am afraid, so very afraid, of being alone. _That_ is my worst nightmare, and what might be different if people knew? 

Cigarette clenched between my teeth, I shake off the urge to put my fist through the window and slam back into the house, forgetting the hour and the neighbors. I smash my way into the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and things go flying every which way - razors tumbling into the sink, toothpaste. I ignore everything - what I want is on the top shelf. I grab it and storm into the living room, fumbling with the radio until I have my cassette player on and going full blast. To drown out the voices. 

"One - nothing wrong with me 
    
    
    . . . something's got to give
     . . . let the bodies hit the floor. . ."
    

Back into the bathroom, under the stark glaring fluorescents, and I have opened the box and am smearing my face with white greasepaint; turning myself into a walking corpse. Over and over, smearing out the lines, laying it on thick, and when my greasy hands have finished they toss the box to the floor and reach for the tube of black lipstick. I had these things before, when I went to confront Kolyai, had them for image's sake but now they are survival. I am thinking about nothing except death, and sex, and the invasion, God fucking damn it. The invasion. _Their_ invasion. 

When I am finished my hands are filthy but I don't bother to wash them; instead I take a final drag on the cigarette and look at myself in the mirror. The walking crow, crazy fucking Mulder. The undead. Face white as a corpse's, a clown's, black lined mouth and eyes like a zombie in a movie. Only this isn't a movie. 

"I say I'm dead. . . and I move." 

I walk into the center of the room and the feeling is everything, and I can feel myself getting hard, pulsing, so I spread my arms and arch my head back, screaming to the room and the night and the ghosts of everything past: 

**"HERE I AM!! COME AND GET ME!! I _AM_ BILL MULDER'S SON, HERE I AM, COME THE FUCK _FOR_ ME!!"**

The door rattles and I jump in spite of myself; I knew he was coming, _knew_ it, so why should I jump? I move behind the door, and when it swings open I leap behind him and get an arm around his throat, slamming the door and dragging him into the darkness before he can get his good arm up and to his gun. He is fast and good - damned good - but I have the edge and the element of surprise. 

". . .what. . ?" he begins. 

I let him go and he stands in the center of the room, staring at me. I know that look, and I wait. 

"Mulder, Jesus," Krycek says. "What the _hell_ have you done to yourself?" 

". . . why?" 

"You look. . . dangerous." He licks his lips. "You look _hot_. Like a. . . like a black panther that's broken its chain." 

"Costumed, Alex," I tell him. "It's the end of the world." 

"You crazy fucking. . ." 

He doesn't have a chance to finish. In a moment I have leapt at him, across the room, and in one motion I am on my knees in front of him and my Colt .45 is jammed into his stomach. I hear him curse softly in Russian, but he doesn't push me away. I can tell I am smearing makeup on the front of his black jeans, but I don't care - I can feel him stiffening, his dick pushing against the front of his jeans and throbbing urgently. I brush my lips across it, tugging, breathing into his crotch, and I whisper: 

"Do me, Alex. It's the end of the world - fucking _do_ me. Do me _hard_." 

He doesn't need a second invitation. 

In a rustle and a whirlwind of motion I am on the floor and his mouth is at my neck, kissing, nipping, and he has pulled my jacket off and pushed my gun aside. I feel him sliding out of his jeans, tugging at mine, and suddenly I am naked, bent over the couch in the dark, on my knees and waiting for him. Like a supplicant. Submitting. 

"Fucking _do_ me," I hiss. "What are you _waiting_ for?" 

"All this,   
I seek,   
I find I push the envelope to the line, make it,   
break it,   
take it. . ." 

His body is hot, his muscles hard, and he shoves my legs apart and hovers over me, panting. "Mulder, Mulder, crazy fucking Mulder," he mutters. "Oh, God, Jesus Christ." I feel the tip of his dick against my ass, teasing, and then suddenly in one motion he thrusts into me. It is hard, and hot, and I scream without words, scream like the end of the world. He pulls back and then he finds a rhythm, sliding into me, slamming, and with each thrust I scream again, his name, curses, muttered obscenities between my teeth. There is no lubricant and he is going hard and it hurts, and I hear myself telling him to hurt me, hurt me _more_ , go _harder_ , don't _stop_. Again, and again, in and out and then deeper still and I howl until my throat is raw, feeling him convulse against me and suddenly the black hole is gone, swirling, gone in a rush of pleasure and pain so great it wipes everything from my mind except the throbbing, aching orgasm. I hear Alex grunt against me, and then go slack. 

"Crazy fucking Mulder," he whispers. 

I roll over, a foot or two of carpet separating us, and look at him. God, he is beautiful, and I catch my breath and realize that I am crying. 

Alex. Dear Alex, beating me out of myself. Hurting me. _Taking_ me. Letting it all go. 

My eyes are wet, smeared with black like a cartoon nightmare. And inside is raging, raging, and a sorrow too deep for words, too deep for death. I roll over, my body damp, and the black heaviness of my Colt .45 slides into my hand like the kiss of an angel. I squeeze the grip, open my hand and close it again. And then I raise the gun. 

"I love you, Alex," I say, softly, so softly. "It's all coming down." 

He looks at me, still breathing hard, his eyes suddenly wide and more naked than he'd ever have wanted them to be. God, he's beautiful, like his own black panther, too slick and too good. Too brilliant and too handsome. Flame and fire and the end of the world, flames on the baseball field and dying children. He's too good. Too good for that. Inside me is a black hole, dark, raging, swallowing everything. _Invading_. 

"Mulder. . ." Krycek begins, moving toward me, but too slowly, too slowly. He knows, I think, he knows, God. 

"Resist or serve, Alex," I say. "It's _over_." 

And I pull the trigger. The explosion is deafening in the tiny room. 

The moment 

moment 

the moment draws 

the moment draws out forever 

and forever 

and ever 

and ever. 

I come back to myself sprawled against the couch, my legs spread, my naked body splattered with crimson droplets. Black and white and red all over, and who is the joke on this time? *I just _killed_ Alex Krycek.* I think of the way he moves, the way his body felt against mine. Meeting him in the alley, the bathroom in Hong Kong. All the times, all the times I saw his eyes in the mirror. Everything I wanted, everything I always wanted and couldn't have. I saved him, really, I saved him from Tunguska, I saved him from Kolyai and I saved him, damn it, from the end of the world. He will be remembered. Walk-ins. Alex fucking Krycek, the beautiful god of sex and guns and death. The man who made me an orphan. I loved him. 

I roll my head back and pick up the gun from where it lies, and whisper my goodbyes to Alex, to life, to my father. To Scully. Resist or serve. The black hole is everywhere, swallowing everything, and it has all swirled into a kind of peace. I can't live, now, of course, my God, my Christ, I've done it. I've _saved_ them. There is nothing more I can do. 

The gun in my mouth, God, I loved him, and I taste gun oil and the splatters of his blood. I am Bill Mulder's son, and here is where I save myself. I am only human, after all. Sweaty and slick, naked, I lie there and close my eyes. Flames and fire, and what else is beyond? Something better. I know it. I learned it from Samantha. 

I hear nothing more. 

"I can see it in my mind- 

I can see it in their eyes 

It's close enough to touch it now 

but far away enough to die 

. . . click, click- 

boom." 

* * *

All lyrics are from "Fade", by Staind; "Click Click Boom", by Saliva; "Bodies", by Drowning Pool. Thanks to Disturbed's "Down With the Sickness" for inspiration. 

COSTUMED by Fox Mulder 9/16-9/17 2001 

* * *

If you enjoyed this story, please send feedback to Fox Mulder 


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